This morning it was time for my annual doctors appointment. I was at 10:00 and Colin was at 2:00.
When I was done I decided that I really didn't have anything planned so I drove over to see my friend Susan. I had not seen her since Shelly's wedding so we had a lot to catch up on. The fun part was that another friend showed up who I had not seen since last summer so we also got to catch up.

On the way home I stopped and got a few groceries and then headed back to the trailer. We had a quick bite to eat and then went for a walk (5km) After that I was pretty tired so I had a little nap before dinner. Another good day.

After breakfast I took the truck to the back of the park where there just happens to be a pile of nice course gravel. I loaded up a couple of buckets and garbage can and brought it back to our lot. I spread it around our little tree and our number post. After that I cut all the grass and Colin and I put rocks around the fire pit. Our lot looks really nice. I also put our coloured Solar Globes under the Pine tree and when it got dark out they started to glow and change colours......they are really pretty!

New Hair!!


Tuesday morning it was time to get organized and get my hair done. First I went to Colin's Mom and Dads to put rollers in Mom's hair. Since she fractured her shoulder she hasn't been able to do much with it herself. After it was rolled up it was my turn.

I went into the hairdressers and had at least 5" chopped off. It was time for a change. When it was all done I was pleased with the results. After that I went back to Mom's and took the rollers out and combed her hair out. She too looked much better. I think it gave her a real boost.

On the way home I stopped in Elora and washed the truck. When I got back to the park I wiped it all down and then put tire dressing on the tires......it looks so nice when it's all clean!

Shelly and her Baby Bump making dinner.


Shelly and her current baby....Bailey.


Shelly entertaining the puppies.

l Princess Splash waiting for bedtime.


On Sunday morning we got up, and then got ready to clean all the carpets in the trailer. We were leaving for an overnight stay in Mississauga so we thought it was a perfect time to do it and then leave them to dry. Since Fuel for the truck costs so much these days we have combined this trip to Shelly's with a major shopping trip. It just doesn't make sense anymore to make separate trips so we have been combining as often as possible.

We stopped at Mum and Dads before we left and then headed to the big city. We ended up at Shelly's at about 5:30. She made us a great steak dinner and we checked out their bathroom renovations.

In the morning we all had breakfast and then headed for the medical office where they do the Ultra Sounds. We were about 5 minutes late but she went in almost right away. They took about 1/2 an hour to do all the medical stuff and then invited us to come in and see our new Grand Baby. WOW!
It was truly amazing! Little legs, arms, toes and fingers, a tiny beating heart and then the final act.......it did this big stretch right there on the screen.......How cute!! I have to say it was a very special moment for me. For those who have never experienced this.......it's a must do!

We did some shopping together afterwards and then had a late lunch. It was a great day ......although a day in the city takes it's toll on me , to say the least I was very happy to be back home in our quiet little spot in Elora.

Although it is only 61 F. the sun is shining and it has stopped raining!

We have been getting a few calls on the Truck so this week-end I will have to spend some time and get her all spiffed up! It has been all cleaned up but it could do with a wash and a vacuum as we have been using it.

Friday night we drove up to Walkerton to have dinner with Ed and Frances. They are busy adding an addition to the back of their house and doing some interlocking brick work and rearranging their gardens. They did not have much time last year after they bought their house and before they left for Texas, finally they are getting to make the changes that will make the house theirs. They just bought a new trailer, a Titanium, a foot longer than their last one and it has 3 slides instead of 1. It had been used but only for a month so basically it is new....2008.

We needed a part for our trailer so we drove up to Maury's just outside of Walkerton and we had a look at the model they bought....very nice. We also looked at the new model of our trailer and decided that although it was very nice and has a bedroom slide we really don't need a new one yet. It was fun to look.

Before we left Frances gave me some fresh Rhubarb so I think a Rhubarb Crisp is in my future.

Mexi helping her Daddy fix the Weed-Eater.


There is definitely something that smells good here!


My Wagon Wheel I brought all the way from Mexico, finally in it's spot in my yard in Elora.


Ginny, chillin out with Grampa.......she is just sooo cute!


We were both very happy to be parked someplace and not have to battle the long week-end traffic. We did a little rental work and did some more work on the yard. I put out my wagon wheel I bought in Mexico and weed whipped all the edges. Note to self: Do not wear sandals when using a weed eater. When that little piece comes off the end .....it can stick right into the end of your toe....by 1/2 and inch!! OUCH!

On Monday Luke and Shelly arrived for dinner with the dogs. We had a good visit although Shelly had a nasty cold.

All the dogs had a great time playing together and vying for any scrapes left from dinner.

All settled into the Gorge Park.


Most of Thursday was spent driving around and checking all of our rental properties. Over the winter we seem to have accumulated enough couches and old furniture to start a used furniture store........6 at one property. I guess we need something to keep us busy over the summer. All in all we are in better shape than last year. Only a small one bedroom apartment to redo once we get the current tenant out.

Friday I stayed home while Colin went out to collect some rent. I made homemade hamburger patties for the freezer, 5 individual serving shepherds pies for the freezer and a dozen muffins. After that I did 5 loads of laundry, and washed two dogs, after that I mowed all our grass. I couldn't believe I actually got our lawn mower going. It is an old one my brother gave me which he bought in 1970. It has been sitting under a tarp under the picnic table all winter. I pulled it out, put fresh gas into it and topped up the oil.......3 pulls and she was running. That made me very happy!

We still have to get ride of the old fridge that came out but other than that we are pretty much all set up.

The dried up ammonia that leaked out of the old fridge.

Mexi checking Colin out through the hole where the fridge was.

I think I am in love..........


Today was set aside to take out the old fridge and put the new one in. After breakfast Colin started to disconnect the propane to the old fridge and remove the old fridge. When we remove the old fridge there was quite a bit of dried up ammonia underneath it. Next we cleaned out the empty space an then got ready to stuff the new into the hole. It could not have fit better if the fridge had been made specifically for this trailer. I am very happy to have a fridge that is twice the size of the old one. Adds a whole new meaning to putting away groceries!!

In the afternoon we went and visited with Colin's mom and Dad and then went to Guelph to get groceries and pick up a few other things that we needed.

After putting everything away dinner was late but we got alot done today.

One piece of bridge coming through!

New fridge.....all we have to do is get it inside now!


Tuesday morning we packed up the trailer at Nicole's and got ready to head out. Getting out of our spot there, proved to be more difficult than getting in but compared to being stuck at the end of a dead end road it was a piece of cake. We said our goodbyes to Nicole and Timothy and headed down hwy 11 towards Orillia.

They are doing quite a bit of road work around South River and as we drove down the road we met up with some huge sections of bridge being delivered with police escorts. We must have passed about 10 of them in about a 30 mile stretch. Great way to build a bridge!

We stopped at Weber's just outside of Orillia for burgers. You park on one side of the road and then take the footbridge over the highway to get to the actual restaurant. As this place is quite famous there was a line up out the door but they are very organized and in no time at all we were sitting at a picnic table outside enjoying our burgers.

Our next stop was in Orillia at the Home Depot and Future Shop in search of our new fridge. We found one that would work but decided that we would carry on to Barrie to see what they had. In Barrie we were able to check Bad Boy, TA Appliances, Sears and Home Depot with one stop. Then we went over to Rona and Costco......Rona doesn't sell appliances and Costco had only white and we were looking for stainless steel.

Bad Boy and Home Depot had the same fridge but Bad Boy was alot cheaper. We went into home Depot and they price matched plus gave us another 10% off. We put it in the trailer and strapped it to the door so it could not move and headed homeward.

We stopped for dinner in Orangeville and then finally the last leg of the trip to Elora Gorge Park. By the time we were sort of settle it was 11:00. I went up to use the bathroom and when I flushed suddenly I had water everywhere.! After some investigation we discovered that a fitting had popped apart so water was not going into the bowl but all over the floor. A little JB Weld and that was fixed but could not be used for 18 hours. I am just glad to be settled for a while even with two fridges and a broken toilet.

By the time everyone got moving this morning Nicole had made us a great steak and eggs breakfast which everyone enjoyed. I helped her clean up the kitchen and then Luke and Shelly got ready to leave to visit Luke's grandma in Elliott Lake. We decided to do some driving around the area to see if there were any cottages around here that might be interesting to us. We drove some interesting roads but decided that there really was not too much of interest for us here.

By the time we got back, The kids were home from school and shortly after that Rob came home so we had dinner together and then headed back to the trailer. We will have an early night tonight so we can leave reasonable in the morning. Lots to do.....like find a new fridge......the icebox thing is wearing a little thin.

Getting reacquainted with my great nephew Timothy.......he's just too cute for his own good.


He's such a little snuggler!

We had very good intentions of leaving by 10:00 but I have been having some serious headaches so we did not get away till 11:30. We headed South to Sudbury and then down HWY 11 towards South River and the town of Machar where my niece Nicole lives. We entered the directions in the GPS like she said we should do and started to drive to where we thought her house was........NOT!

We started up this one road and just at the same moment we decided we were in the wrong place, Nicole called us to see where we were. There was only one small problem.......it was a dead end road and no where to turn a 37' trailer around.........Uh, oh! We got to the end of the road hoping to find a turn around.........only a soggy narrow drive way and a trail up the hill ahead. To make a long story short, my directions to Colin were bad and we sort of missed the driveway, had to unhook the trailer move the truck around on an angle and slide the hitch out.....first time ever, rehook the truck on, and ease.....ever so ....carefully around. I figured that we were there for the rest of the summer, but no we got her turned around.....not something I would want to do on a regular basis, but at least now we know how to do it.

Shelly and Luke were already at Nicole's place by the time we got there and dinner was a little delayed. A little more maneuvering in the farm lane beside their house and we were finally parked.

We had an awesome steak dinner, sat and talked for a while but then headed back to the trailer as Rob had to leave for work at 5:00 and the boys had to go to school. It's really too bad that life goes on for people who are not retired.

Shelly and Luke stayed in the trailer with us as they had the dogs with them. It was a long day and very tiring with all that trailer shuffling so I was glad to hit the sheets.

I did get lovely flowers from Shelly and Luke for Mother's Day and a call from Cort earlier in the day.

Unfortunately my last day here left alot to be desired. I was in bed till 2:00 with a migraine. I spent most of the night trying to figure out how to keep my dinner down and how to lay without making my head hurt.....not fun!

When I did get up Colin told me that he had made an appointment to see a cottage along the Serpent River. We drove past it yesterday so today he wanted to see it. It's in a beautiful location right on the river......in fact you could fish right off the deck. The however is......the house is not great, 2 X 4 floor joists make for a not so stable floor and there would be alot of fixing up to do. There were some foundation cracks as well that gave rise to concern. The accessory building on the lot is an old Portable School room. Colin walked to one side of it and I thought the whole thing might fall over. Even at $99,000.00 it was more work than we were willing to take on .....better to build something new and have it done properly than to try and fix up someone else's mess.

When we got back to the trailer we packed up all our stuff and got ready to leave in the morning.

We drove into town in the afternoon to stop by the Lake front properties office to ask a few questions regarding mail and parcel delivery. We stopped by the Building Department to get some info on applying for a permit. We wanted to get a copy of the Zoning By-Law for the area we are interested in but the Clerks office was already closed for the week-end.

On the way back to the trailer we picked up some ice to stock our "Ice Box". We then drove into Spanish to Vance's Hotel and Restaurant for all you can eat Pickerel Dinner, it was very good!

On the way home we pulled into a few little roads we had not yet traveled and found some very interesting things. As you approach this one road there is a burned out Van with of course a bathtub in it sitting not quite in the middle of the road. As you proceed further you can just get by a truck and a car beside a big pile of tires.......a little bit farther and there is huge back hoe with a scoop on it tipped into the ditch ......then there is the various and sundry fridges, stoves, dryers, vacuum cleaners.....pretty much anything anyone ever needed to get rid of. It's really kind of sad as this piece of property runs along the river and would be quite nice if it were not for all the junk.

Note to self: If you buy vacant property here......make sure you walk the whole thing......you never know what you might find!

Colin? Reading Instructions??? Who would have thought that would ever happen!


Colin trying to figure out where everything should be installed.


YEAH!! In the Water.........now we just need to get the motor started.

Touring Depot Lake
Mexi is new at this boating thing!


Today we decided that we would launch our new Dinghy and tour Depot Lake on our own. We loaded our brand new motor, life jackets and all the necessary gear into the truck and headed for the Lake. First we had to inflate the boat , put the floor in, mount the Depth Sounder, and add the motor. Yea......we were ready to go......load in all the stuff and the dogs and the people and off we went. Since the motor is new we had to break it in and only go half speed for the first 10 minutes. By the time we got to the bottom of the lake Colin tried to speed it up a little bit but the motor would not put the boat up on plane. He was disappointed as he thought the motor would work better. We carried on a little further and again he tried to go a little faster. We found that there was alot of water spraying up at the back.......... Colin had installed these great little wheels at the back to help launch the boat by hand and they work really well.......except.......when the boat is actually in the water. They are supposed to be pulled up. Guess what...... the boat planed no problem with them up!

We did have a good tour of the lake and managed to pick out several lots that we would be interested in. We also got out and walked around on one which we thought was particularly interested.

By the time we got back to the trailer it was almost 9:00 and we were hungry so we had some salad and chicken with asparagus and then settled in for some TV.

The Workers on the line


Entrance to the Train Museum.


Dumb and Dumber waiting in the truck while I took the train picture.


The Silver Moose.


Yesterday we made an appointment with Lakeview Properties to tour Depot Lake. We arrived at the office at 12:30 and rode with Paul (our Guide) to Depot Lake where we launched the boat and headed out. There are two areas on Depot Lake that are appealing and then two more areas on Grandeur Lake. There is a series of about 4 lakes all connected together and this gives you about 7 miles of Lakes to explore. The scenery is beautiful!! I think to date this looks the most interesting to us.

When we were done our tour we went back into Elliott Lake and had some lunch. We picked up groceries on the way home and then headed back to the trailer to pick up the dogs for some more touring, this time around Lauzon Lake. We found a few vacant lots and a few cottages already built but nothing that we really thought of as possibles.

On the way home we checked out some Properties fronting on Georgian Bay but found nothing waterfront for sale.

We did find a Railway Museum that was interesting but nothing to buy.

When we arrived back at the campground, the most interesting rig pulled in......think it was a custom build but pretty neat.

We had a laid back day today and did not leave the trailer till after lunch. We drove up to the township office to see if they had any property for sale. They did have one but I think the lady we got the information from was confused as the price was 20,000.00 more than she told us and the property was smaller than she told us, and it was not really water front. We will do a bit more research on this but I think it is a no.

We also determined today that our fridge is more than likely unrepairable, we are not sure what route we will take yet on the replacement but it has been the subject of alot of discussion.

We made arrangements with Lake view Properties to go on a boat tour of the Lake they will be releasing in the fall.

We drove into Elliott Lake and did a bit of shopping and refilled our propane tank. The nights have been cold here so we have been using our furnace alot.

After dinner tonight we went for coffee at a couple's home that we met at the park. He and his wife work at the KOA and have been very helpful and helping us root out available properties.
We had a nice visit.

When we got back to the trailer and watched some TV and then decided it was time for bed.

The White River running along side the Deer Trail


Everything is budding


Very Cool Tree House


After last nights rain it was nice to wake up to bright sunshine. After sitting with my morning tea at the computer I decided to get my rear in gear and make something to eat before we headed out to drive the Deer Trail Route. ........Uh, Oh!! Everything in the freezer was soft......very soft......cool but not cold. The fridge has been acting a bit funny lately but we have always managed to get it going again.........ya.......not today. Colin had to drive 25 minutes to get ice. We have basically turned the fridge into a huge icebox. I cooked everything that was thawed, 6 chicken breasts, 2 bags of shrimp, a roll of chopped turkey and a bag of seafood mix. After all that cooking and cleaning up and repackaging we were ready for our days tour.

The first part of the trail takes you right to Elliott Lake and then out of the back and into the wilderness. Just before we left the Elliott Lake area we found an open house at a house on Dunlop Lake. It was very nice but it was $369,000.00......a little out of our price range. There were some spectacular views and vistas. We saw a hawk and a very curious Porcupine. We drove for quite a way along the side of White River which offered some amazing scenery.

Just before we got to Iron Bridge we found the coolest tree house ever. It was like a little castle in a tree.

When we finally got back to the trailer it was time to take the dogs for a walk and then cook some of the food for dinner that we are going to loose if we don' t eat it quickly.

Hey kids, look what we found......The Big Canoe


We set out today for the town of Spanish, in search of the elusive perfect cottage. We looked at a new log cabin with detached single garage. It was built on top of a huge boulder and although the waterfront leveled out nicely, it was quite a trip to get there. The cottage itself would have been the right size but was terribly laid out. Then there was the driveway, no way could you get up it in the winter you would just to have to stay in the cabin till the snow melted.

We found another one that had a driveway even worse than the first. There was a park model trailer on the lot with a huge deck. We figure that the original driveway had to have been on an adjoining property which had since sold......there is no way that trailer is ever coming out of there unless it comes up in pieces at the end of a winch!

We did have a heart warming moment today though......we drove into Blind River and found one of our previous boats , the "Big Canoe" now named Canoodle. It must be owned by the same people that we sold it to, as they were from here and renamed it that. It looked fabulous! They have done some work to the super structure and repainted the whole top, possibly fiberglassed it. That was my all time favorite boat and it really made me feel good to know that someone was taking good care of her. I would have taken a picture but my memory card was full on the camera.

It's always good to end a bad day of cottage hunting with a good memory.......

After breakfast and packing some stuff to eat on route, we headed for Dunlap Lake. This Lake started development about 3 years ago and has only a few lot still available. It is a very pretty lake but as for the lots most have very steep drops to the waters edge and would make it almost impossible to use the waterfront. There were some beautiful cottages already built but I don't think this is the lake for us. The second was Quirk Lake and it was one of the first ones to be developed. There was one lot that interested us that was a resale. There were also 2 cottages already built that were for sale. One was finished on the exterior but only stud walls inside and no basement floor was poured. We didn't like it at all as the lot was almost bare of trees and would require alot of landscaping. The cottage itself was rather ugly and looked alot like a big red pimple on a hill. We talked to the neighbor and the price he told us that they wanted for it was ridiculous!
The other one that was available was way too big although it was a much better deal in comparison to the first. It was over 1800 sq ft, completely finished with a detached double garage and beautifully completed grounds. Unfortunately way more than what we are looking for.

At 5:00 we drove into town to take in the local trade show. Lakefront Properties had a booth set up so we stopped and talked to them again. It appears that the lots we are really interested in on Depot Lake will not be available till the fall and you have to physically wait in line to get what you want when they release them. Apparently they have local residents who will hire themselves out and wait in line for you and all the contractors come around with food and goodies for those in line! Must be quite a mob scene.

We had set the alarm to get up at 8:30 but since we both woke up at 7:30 we decided to get up and get going. We put all our hoses and everything back in the trailer that was suppose to be there and then hooked up the truck. After saying good-bye to Cort and hugging Phin we were on the road by 10:00 AM.

We made good time and were in Sudbury in time for lunch. We then drove on to Spragge and the KOA Kamp Grounds. the people here were very friendly and we have a nice site right near the back of the park and backing on to a creek. While Colin hooked up the satellite dish I moved the furniture around and did a good vacuuming, did some laundry and then got ready to go out for dinner. We drove into Elliott Lake and had a little look around and on route we stopped to check out Depot Lake where we are hoping to buy property.

There is still lots to see and do in the following days.